Small Business and Technology Development Center in Salisbury, Maryland – $17,327 for creation of educational business development workshops catered toward watermen

Southern Maryland Agricultural Development Commission of the Tri-County Council for Southern Maryland in Hughesville, Maryland – $5,650 for increasing accessibility to farmers markets to SNAP participants

Upper Shore Regional Council in Chestertown, Maryland – $19,900 for building a Harvest Directory mobile resource and app.

For Fiscal Year 2014, the RMC received 30 applications requesting more than $577,000 in funding and dispersed a total of $167,000. Of the nine organizations awarded grants, three serve residents of the Eastern Shore of Maryland, two serve Western Maryland, and two are based in Southern Maryland. The remaining two organizations have a statewide focus.

MAERDAF provides grants to rural-serving nonprofit organizations that promote statewide and regional planning, economic and community development, and agricultural and forestry education. Also eligible are rural community colleges that support small and agricultural businesses through enhanced training and technical assistance. The program’s goal is to increase the overall capacity of these organizations and community colleges to meet a multitude of rural development challenges and to help them establish new public/private partnerships for leveraging non-state sources of funding.

Congratulations to all awardees! Information about the Fiscal Year 2015 MAERDAF grant program will be released in Summer 2014.